“Chinese censors are likely exploiting YouTube’s copyright infringement reporting system to erase political content,” Radio Free Asia reported last year (“YouTube shuts down satirical spoof video channel targeting Chinese leader Xi Jinping,” February 21, 2023).
The victim in this case was the RutersXiaoFanQi channel, “whose name amalgamates the Chinese word ‘to humiliate’ with that of the news agency Reuters.”
The takedown comes as Chinese censors grow increasingly concerned about satirical content about Xi Jinping coming from overseas, where students and activists recently demonstrated in solidarity with the “white paper” protests that swept China at the end of 2022, and where social media accounts often post content that would be banned or blocked in China.
It suggests Chinese censors are using YouTube’s copyright infringement reporting system to shut down content they find politically unacceptable, according to a fellow satirist.
Thanks presumably to publicity about the unjustified shutdown, YouTube restored the channel at some point and perhaps also modified the automated system for dealing with copyright complaints. I found other reports about the shutdown but none about how RutersXiaoFanQi was able to at least for now get back in action.
One of the channel’s recent efforts is entitled, as Google-Translated, “What bad things has Xi Jinping done?”
The song accompanying the images, “This life is wasted,” attributed to Angang, is in Chinese, and a separate YouTube video of the song gives the lyrics in Chinese characters. Google’s translation seems imperfect, but here are a few words of it:
Pick a bolt of lightning and throw it into the darkness, create an abyss and split the valley.
Pull up a thick cloud of smoke to cover the bones, and carry a letter to inscribe absurdity on it.
How unexpected it must be before the rose can smell it like a strong drink that looks calm on the outside.
How persistent do you have to be to love the wrong path and be a stubborn hill?
How old do you have to be before you can step into a grave, like a pearl whose heart is as gray as death?
